South Sudan                                                          

Stephen Martin, SCIAF's Africa Projects Officer is visiting our new office in Juba, the regional capital of southern Sudan. 

Arrival in Juba

Juba is peaceful, and there seems to be a greater measure of hope now filling the air. The place is hot - 36 degrees and very dusty. The roads are still awful and little has changed for the people in this vast land. The Comprenhensive Peace Agreement is mercifully still holding but the people need to see progress if conflict is to retreat well over the horizon.

Day Two

Greetings from the Juba office, we're trying to get to the city of Yei, one hundred miles west of here but our travel plans have been frustrated at every turn. There is no fuel in Juba because of the Kenyan crises and our vehicle is broken and awaiting spare parts. Commercial hire is too expensive - the last quote we received was $5 a litre on top of a fixed price so we tried going by plane but Sudan's Password Airlines have suspended flights to Yei and Uganda's Eagle Air don't know when they will next fly there...

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